People vote for people who solve their problems, not cause them pain. And pain is EXACTLY what all too many candidates give potential voters – AND DONORS – when they talk to them.
When you’re walking door-to-door or attending a meet-and-greet, you don’t have a whole lot of time to get the essence of your campaign message across – nor should you risk putting off a potential voter or donor by droning on and on and on and on…
Especially if you’re droning on and on about…yourself.
Below, Katya Andresen has some quick tips on how to develop a standard “stump” speech – in the biz world it’s called your “elevator pitch” or “mission statement” – that’ll be far better than 97% of other candidates out there on the trail.
Until next time. Onward and rightward…
Dr. Chuck Muth, PsD
Professor of Psephology (homeschooled)
“How to Get More Votes, More Donors & More Volunteers”
P.S. Don’t miss watching the 3-minute/52-second video Katya link’s to. It SOOOO nails it.
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Four things to put in your elevator pitch
By Katya AndresenBy now you’ve heard the term “elevator pitch” a million times. It means compellingly telling your story and why it matters in the time it takes an elevator to travel to its destination.
The reason this is such a worthwhile exercise is that it makes you home in on why someone should care about your cause, and it forces you to make that case succinctly. It’s very hard to do. But once you get it down, it’s handy for so many things: chatting with funders, giving punchy speeches, writing pithy copy.
The speech coach Nick Morgan has published a 99-cent essay on crafting an elevator speech, and it has some good pointers for getting to the point.
1. Grab the attention of the SPECIFIC audience by starting with the word YOU. Make it about the people listening. Why should they care?
2. Identify a need, problem or challenge they have. This gets to that point I’m always making – show how your cause relates to their values.
3. Weave in emotion.
4. Explain how you solve that need or problem.
It’s a good outline for much of nonprofit [and campaign!] marketing.
Think about how often we do the OPPOSITE of this list! We start with I, as in “I’m Katya, and I am…” We talk about what we do, not what we do to address a problem the audience has. Or we let a committee attack our pitch – or mission statement.
Here’s my favorite video on how things go awry. Click here
What’s your pitch? Does it follow this list? Do you also take into account Dan’s advice – are you concrete and do you get at the why?